K_A_Opperman Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I'm still not familiar with de la Mare. Where
> should one start with his work?


Probably the easiest volume to find is the short collection "Missing" published by Hesperus Press Ltd. If you haven't come across any of Hesparus' books before, they have a delightful line of little 100 (or so) page paperback volumes. The de la Mare volume includes three tales "Missing", "Crewe" and (I think)"Miss Duveen". The collection is introduced by Russell Hoban who has a nice piece on de la Mare online at:

[www.bluetree.co.uk]

where he discusses three stories "Seaton's Aunt", "Miss Duveen" and "Crewe". The Hesperus book can be found at:

[www.amazon.co.uk]

and of course elsewhere, I found it on the shelf of a local bookshop.

- Chris



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 20 Jan 12 | 10:56AM by cw67q.

asshurbanipal Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I recently had a very vivid dream which I thought
> would make a good short story in the Jamesian
> tradition. I now wonder whether it isn't a story I
> read many, many years ago which has suddenly
> resurfaced. It starts in the library of an elderly
> gentleman who is showing me an antique Chinese
> wooden box of intricate design, something like an
> outsize tea caddy. The sides are full of little
> doors and windows. He opens one of the doors at
> random and inserts a chess piece, closes the door,
> and then manipulates the box like a seven-a-side
> Rubik cube. Nothing happens. He repeats the
> procedure. Again nothing happens. I seem to sit
> there for hours until at last an unidentifiable
> object of great age emerges from another door.
> "It's always the same," he says. "You never get
> back what you put in, and sometimes you get
> nothing at all."
> In the extensive grounds of the house is a wooden
> summer-house built in obvious imitation of the
> Chinese box by a previous owner of both house and
> box (who had mysteriously disappeared). Nobody
> ever entered the summer-house as it had an evil
> reputation. It was rumoured that anybody who went
> in never came out again, although people were
> sometimes glimpsed peeping through the windows
> with frightened expressions on their faces. I
> entered the summer-house, and there the dream
> ended.
> Has anybody come across a similar story or can I
> have a go at writing it without incurring the
> accusation of plagiarism?

I haven't read anything similar, but it has a huge potential!

I've never read anything like this anywhere, and yes, it's got potential! It is very Jamesian. I would start writing it this very day!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 20 Jan 12 | 01:51PM by K_A_Opperman.

asshurbanipal Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I recently had a very vivid dream which I thought
> would make a good short story in the Jamesian
> tradition. <Snippage>

This is fascinating, and I do not believe you are in any danger of being accused of plagiarism if you developed this into a story. There is just a touch of James's "Mr Humphrey's Inheritance", but just a touch. I ran this past Rosemary Pardoe, editor of GHOSTS & SCHOLARS and its successor, THE M.R. JAMES NEWSLETTER, and she felt ths same way, hoping you would consider developing it into a story.

Jim

Dear All
Many thanks for your encouraging replies. I shall have a go this weekend and see what happens (I shall have to reread Master Humphrey's Inheritance first though).

Is de la Mare's The Return as dense in language and thoughts as his short stories? Or is it more outdrawn, diluted?

Asshurbanipal,
Not to discourage you by any means, it may interest you to read a wonderful and eerie short story called "The Bronze Door" written by Raymond Chandler, which contains elements somewhat similar to the dream you've described. As a long-time admirer of Chandler's hardboiled detective novels (e.g., The Big Sleep, The Lady in the Lake), I stumbled across a wonderful omnibus edition of most everything he published which most unexpectedly included this gem of a story near the end. Look forward to reading your story.

Sandor Szabo

cw67q Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Probably the easiest volume to find is the short
> collection "Missing"

Ironically.

Hi Sandor Szabo
Many thanks for the information. I have a couple of Chandler omnibuses, but neither contains The Bronze Door. I shall have to find this somewhere. Many thanks also to those who encouraged me with this idea, and now the deed is done - THE CHINESE BOX in 2000 words is complete. It isn't the greatest story ever written, but I've read worse (and in print). What to do with it now, though?

The Everyman's Library Chandler collection contains "The Bronze Door."

asshurbanipal Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Hi Sandor Szabo
> Many thanks for the information. I have a couple
> of Chandler omnibuses, but neither contains The
> Bronze Door. I shall have to find this somewhere.
> Many thanks also to those who encouraged me with
> this idea, and now the deed is done - THE CHINESE
> BOX in 2000 words is complete. It isn't the
> greatest story ever written, but I've read worse
> (and in print). What to do with it now, though?


Rosemary Pardoe of the Ghosts and Scholars M. R. James Newsletter would like to see your story. Her email address is pardos@globalnet.co.uk

Jim

Aloha Asshurbanipal,
Well hopefully you'll post it here so we can enjoy it. Mahalo,

Sandor Szabo

Hi Jim
Many thanks for your continued interest. I shall email Rosemary Pardoe moy pronto.

Hi Sandor
Again many thanks for your interest, but I'm not sure that a site dedicared to Clark Ashton Smith would be the proper place for my efforts. I mentioned the idea to find out whether my dream was original or whether something had resurfaced from the distant past. I rather expected somebody to say, "Yes, I read The Chinese Box some years ago in a collection by ******* *******," but I'm glad to say that didn't happen. Let me keep you posted, though.

K_A_Opperman Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I, personally, find Oliver Onions' 'ghost stories'
> excruciatingly boring--I can't imagine Lovecraft
> thinking all that highly of him. Sure, "The
> Beckoning Fair One" is alright, but the rest of
> his 'supernatural' stuff, I find (I have not read
> all of it, but a a lot of it), is of far poorer
> quality, in terms of how entertaining it is--which
> is my foremost criterion for good fiction.
>

Are not even "Benlian", "The Lost Thyrus", "Rooum", "The Painted Face", and "The Rosewood Door" any good? Wasted time to search them out?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 13 Feb 12 | 07:36AM by Knygatin.

It's been awhile, but if I remember correctly, Rooum and Rosewood Door were among the better tales I read by Onions; and between those, I think I liked Rooum better.... I, personally, don't care much for his tales--but if you'd like to give them a try, seek out his omnibus volume in the Wordsworth Mystery and the Supernatural series. It can be gotten for very cheap--so if you're curious, you can't go wrong. But a warning to the curious: James is much better.